Corruption at Institutions of Higher Learning

I remember some years ago when an Australian friend whose father was a professor of Civil Engineering telling me in a joking way that his dad would always ask who designed and built any bridge that he was going to cross in a certain Island nation. You see, almost all (which is not many) of the engineering graduates of that island were trained in Australia. The late professor who knew his students, was not going to take his chances.

And so would most of us had we known that a certain building such as places of worship,stadiums, bridges or tower construction is designed and built by half-baked professionals.

Much as we like to think that all technical professionals are well qualified to undertake jobs such as construction, it might not always be the case. Look at what happened in Trengganu, an east-coast state where a stadium roofs kept collapsing as well as that of a place of worship. These are public places and any such incident could have caused loss of many lives not to mention broken limbs and other injuries. By the way, we have yet to hear the official result of the investigation into the collapsed stadium roofs! It did not only collapse once (2009) but twice (2013) here. The cost of building the stadium was well over RM250 million of taxpayers’ money and the repair cost so far? ….Well that is Malaysia.

Really as a matter of public interests, students who are not performing well and fail their examinations should not be allowed to graduate in that technical field. The “gatekeepers” in this respect are the lecturers and professors at these so called Higher Learning Institutions. Unfortunately we have the odd lecturers who would betray our trust by passing those weak students through corruption. These lowlife demand money to pass their students who go on to get their degrees.

A report here is disconcerting. Such scumbags of the academia should be punished severely. They are not only a shame to their profession but they also bring disrepute to the institutions they work in.

The professional bodies of respective fields must have a system of check and balance whereby graduates involved in public works should get post-graduate certification perhaps through attachment or examinations to ensure their ability to undertake civil works.

That is why employers will factor in the name of the IHL where the job applicant has studied when they are recruiting. The probability of getting a fake professional is rare if he/she had studied in well known and reputable institutions which guard their names zealously.